One Lesson to Rule Them All

The following is David Emond’s third guest post on the WARRIORS blog. To view David’s first article on workout efficiency, click here, and his second article on the importance of focusing during a workout, click here. In this article, David the most important thing he has learned from his all his time spent in the classroom and in gym, but you’ll have to read it to find out what his most important lesson is. Enjoy! – Schuyler

By: David Emond

Here I am halfway through my third year of Kinesiology at the University of Waterloo.  It’s been quite the ride so far. Throughout my time here, I’ve had the opportunity to learn from some top-notch professors and other individuals on various training methods and the science behind them. I’ve been able to learn a great deal of anatomy, biomechanics and physiology to apply to performance enhancement.

Strength Coaching 101: Summer School Edition

By: Schuyler Schmidt

This summer I had the privilege of interning with the strength coach of a local professional hockey team. Working alongside an already established strength coach was an incredible learning experience for a novice like me. Here are some of my thoughts and observations for other aspiring strength coaches.

How Lifting Weights Made Me More of a Woman

The following is a guest post from Rouzeen Imaan, a 3rd year AHS student and first-time contributor to the WARRIORS blog. To learn more about Rouzeen, check out her bio at the bottom of the page. In this article, Rouzeen shares her personal story about how weight lifting drastically changed her life and helped her grow into a strong, confident woman. Enjoy! – Austin

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By: Rouzeen Imaan

This article isn’t here to tell you how lifting weights will give you a fantastic female body — high perky butt, great legs and a great set of abs. That’s not what I mean by “more of a woman”.  Women can look any damn way they want. I’m trying to dig a little deeper.

Let’s start with me.

I’m 22 years young. Female. Indian. Muslim. Bodybuilder.

  Stereotypes, come at me.

In high school, I wore a headscarf, a decision that wasn’t really mine but came with the turf of being the daughter of a priest. A priest’s daughter, that’s right. As a result of not being able to portray myself the way I wanted to, I had pathetically low levels of self-esteem. At heart I was an extrovert who lacked confidence to do all the extrovert things I wanted to do, like dance in public and twerk on a goose.

5 Exercises My Ego Prevented Me From Doing

By: Schuyler Schmidt

I have an ego. I’ll admit it. I’m not above taking a quick glance around the gym, making note of the exercises others are doing and mentally declaring myself better. In my mind, I’m the strongest, fastest, and best trained person in the gym. In reality, my stubbornness and pride have created more holes in my training than I care to admit. Check your ego at the door, like I did, and see if you can’t also benefit from some “too easy” exercises.

The 3 Days of Working Out

By: Schuyler Schmidt

Summer break means more time to play around with my workouts. In April, I devised a new workout strategy that would allow me to stay in shape while also becoming more technically sound in my lifts, learn new stuff, and enjoy the wonderful heat and humidity of a Pennsylvania summer.

Listening to a podcast while driving to work recently, I discovered that Gray Cook already had this exact same idea, which he calls, “Practice Days, Training Days, and Fun Days.” Here is my take on this training routine…

How to Achieve Bulk Naturally

By: James

The following is a guest post by James, his first for the club. James is a personal trainer and bodybuilding enthusiast, who is a contributing author for www.musclegrowthexpert. com. In this article, he discusses how to naturally get the gains and physique you want. As always, enjoy and comment below! -Schuyler

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Most sensible and experienced professional bodybuilders understand that training the natural way is much more beneficial in the long run than using artificial and potentially harmful supplements. Artificial techniques, such as the use of anabolic steroids, can have devastating effects on your body, such as shrunken testicles, and more importantly, heart and liver problems.  So, if you are trying to achieve muscle size sans synthetic supplements, you should try to stick to natural supplements that blend well with effective exercise. The basic rule is that if you want fast results, you should work hard for them, instead of opting for a quick, short route.  Here are my tips for building good muscle mass in a natural way.

The Newcomer’s Guide to the Weight Room

By: Praneeth Ellanti

I recently started working as a personal trainer and have noticed that most newcomers to the gym make the same 5 mistakes. I truly believe that if these “sins” were avoided, everyone could have a safer, more efficient workout, while also gaining a more positive gym experience, in addition to getting stronger.

Coaching the Single Leg Deadlift

Ben Lee, BASc

The single leg deadlift is an effective exercise for the development of the glutes and posterior chain, grip, and lateral core, while also teaching proprioception, stability and force generation off one leg. Unfortunately, this exercise is often overlooked in favour of the bilateral deadlift and squat, and often poorly performed. While squatting and deadlifting on two legs allows you to use much heavier loads, and in turn develop strength and hypertrophy to a greater degree, the single leg variation is a great workout addition to any athlete who needs to be strong and stable in a unilateral stance.

Learn to Train 6: Give Back

By: Kory Allen

I realize this seminar was almost 4 weeks ago and this review should have been completed not long after the seminar finished… However, my mind has been too boggled from the assault of knowledge and awesome this weekend entailed, therefore prolonging it’s release. Now I think I’ve finally been able to digest what was learned, and the last bit of Chipotle’s has exited my system, allowing me to formalize my thoughts into this summary.

The weekend was composed of a lot of learning and unlearning. It involved tones of growth and an atmosphere hard to replicate in any other gym on the planet. Some serious poundage’s were ripped from the floor, squatted, and pressed to the heavens above.

Live. Learn. Pass on.

…was the core message of the weekend and these jedi (masters of force) were kind enough to take their time to educate myself, other lifters, and coaches on how to train.

 Apparently you can fit this much brilliance in one room.

For the sake of the EliteFTS motto, it is my responsibility to pass the experience and knowledge I acquired from these brilliant minds on to you. Without further ado, here are the presenters and the biggest nuggets of wisdom I learned from each of them.

MacGyver Conditioning

By: Eric Bowman

The following is a guest post from Eric Bowman; his third so far for the club. To view Eric’s other articles, click here and here. In this article, Eric discusses some unconventional ways to make cardio training fun and effective. As always, enjoy and comment below! – Schuyler

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While I believe strength should be at the forefront of every training program, what good is your strength if you can’t run away from a pissed off Canada Goose without being out of breath, even if you can bench 500 pounds.

A common sight in Waterloo.

Unfortunately, though, when most of people think of cardio, they think of “running” on a treadmill or aimlessly pedalling on a bike for an hour. The only enjoyment in this is getting to watch a couple episodes of Duck Dynasty on the TV attached to your cardio machine of choice.  Conditioning can and should be fun, efficient, and a great way to build a solid physique and work capacity. That being said, commerical gyms make this difficult, considering most don’t even have a Prowler for you to work with. When the weather outside sucks, many people complain about cardio training or worse yet, stop training altogether. So how do you get a decent cardio workout in when you have no useful equipment and the weather outside is lousy? Solution: MacGyver conditioning. In this article, several unique, fun ways to become fit with minimal to no equipment are explored.